Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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415. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the number of data breaches experienced by her Department in each of the past ten years and to date in 2023. [42373/23]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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My Department identified the following number of data breaches in each of the years since 2016 and to date in 2023. No records are available for the period before 2016.

YearNumber of data breaches

201657

2017108

2018226

2019371

2020508

2021646

2022502

2023 to date 482

The vast majority of the confirmed data breaches relate to incidents where customer information was accidentally and inadvertently disclosed to third parties, e.g. misaddressed correspondence by email or post. In each of these incidents, the Department followed procedures in accordance with data protection legislation and every effort was made to secure data as quickly and efficiently as possible.

My Department takes data protection obligations very seriously. In order to protect the personal data of its customers and to minimise data protection incidents, a dedicated Programme Board is in place to oversee data protection matters in the Department.

In addition, my Department has in place a set of data protection policies, standards, procedures and guidelines governing the use of its computer systems and customer data. These policies, procedures and guidelines are kept under constant review and are updated as appropriate.